^ I can confirm from my first playthrough that EDI can survive the Destroy ending. Does indeed not make much sense. Wild guess: might have something to do with the conversation options you've chosen during the course of the game; I always encouraged her to become a self-determined being. Eisengreifer 10:59, April 6, 2012 (UTC)

^ Or maybe EDI somehow isn't the type of technology to be destroyed by the Crucible. Not sure how it's possible, she is based on Reaper tech herself. Will-O-Wisp

EDI was on Earth when the crucible was fired-she wasn't even on the Normandy.

EDI is an AI, and AIs are considered synthetic lifeforms by the game lore. It is repeatedly stated or implied at various points in the ME games. However, the Catalyst only clearly states that destruction will affect the Reapers and the Geth (and maybe Shepard), and doesn't say anything about singular AIs like EDI. My guess is that the writers have overlooked this, either by forgetting that EDI is an AI which should be destroyed along with all other AIs, or by retconning the whole notion that AIs are synthetic lifeforms in the first place. Mitranim

^Or the Indoc. theory is actually correct and all this sequence didn't happen. Bad Dreamer

^^ It's very likely a design oversight. I've stated that multiple times wherever I mentioned that EDI "lives" in the Destroy ending. And based on the Extended Cut announcement, Bioware is standing by their endings, hence IT, however much I've grown to love the theory, is dismissed like rumors to a turian councilor. RShepard227

There is no proof that EDI survives. The one youtube video was doctored. Look if EDI could survive there would be thousands of videos and proof of it. The fact remains EDI dies in the destroy ending. Or to be exact. You will never see EDI walk out of the Normandy in a destroy ending. No one has presented any evidence to show otherwise. Goodmongo

She's never walked out on me when I pick the Destroy ending, although curiously, she also hasn't walked out when I pick Control (even though she would presumably be unaffected by that choice). I only ever see her in the Synthesis ending, but it always has been my assumption that she dies if you choose Destroy. If some people really have seen her walk out, then as has been said, it's likely a production oversight. Maybe it can be rationalized away by saying that, uh...the Crucible's energy only afftects network intelligences like the geth and the Reapers or something? Or maybe it means EDI isn't really as "alive" and sentient as she and the others seem to think?

^^ All the above may be missing a point. Synthetics have backups. EDI in particular, albeit with Reaper tech, as a human construct can be reconstructed.

Could be an oversight, but the spacekid does say you can destroy all synthetic life "if you want". Also, considering that the higher your EMS, the more discriminating the destruction wave is (can actually burn organics and the Earth at the worst, or spare even Shep at the best), might be pausible that it could've spared her. Also, as stated, the control ending doesn't see her walk out either.

Well Shepard is partly synthetic and is meant to die but can still be seen in that brief cutscene drawing a short breath. If he can survive then so can EDI.

This applies beacuse the breath is seen in the destroy ending. There is no argument that EDI can survive the destroy or control endings. It is only in the synergy ending that EDI does not survive, and Shepard does not take a breath in the synergy ending.\

I just finished the game first time and selected the purge and EDI walked off the ship with Joker and Ashly, I thought it was a DEV mistake so i put it into google and found myself here.

EDI can definitely survive the Control ending, (in fact, I'm not sure why people think she wouldn't.) My understanding is that in the Control ending, the people who emerge from the Normandy are: Joker, inexplicably one squad member from Earth (in my playthrough that was EDI) and your love interest or the other squadmate.

In my second playthrough I definitely witnessed EDI walk out of the Normandy just after I chose the Destroy option. Now this could be one of many things, it could simply be one of the MANY developer oversights in the ending - remember that this is ME3's ending we are talking about. Or it could in fact mean something. The Catalyst tells Shepard that choosing to destroy the Reapers means choosing to destroy all synthetic life in the galaxy including Shepard himself, who is partly synthetic, correct? And yet Shepard can live through the explosion if your EMS is high enough, correct? There is also the fact that if your EMS is too low, the initial pulse from the explosion will devastate everything on Earth, including organics (note that this only happens with the energy released in the Sol system, it does not wipe out all organic life in the galaxy). The reason for this is that with fewer resources (total EMS), the Crucible cannot be perfectly tailored to only wipe out synthetics, or Reapers. Now, the Catalyst was wrong about it killing Shepard - meaning he did not know the Crucible's exact power, so who's to say it couldn't be tailored to destroy only Reapers and not synthetics as a whole? I cannot clarify whether EDI can still walk out of the Normandy at the end if your EMS is incredibly low, because I pretty much maxed it out in my playthrough. KingXReaper

Also - regarding talk about EDI, the control ending, and the Geth in the posts above: First, the Geth are no longer networked intelligence anymore, if you recall they used the Reaper code to each become individual intelligence in any case if you spared them. Second, the Joker + EDI scene is only shown in the Synthesis ending, to symbolize the new relationship between organics and synthetics in an Adam & Eve type of way. In the Control ending EDI survives no matter what, but she functions like all the other squadmates, coming out depending on your relationship with them. You just don't get the extra scene like in the Synthesis ending. KingXReaper

Perhaps until somebody develops non-doctored video evidence of EDI's survival in the Destroy ending, we should stick to what is described by the Catalyst. While the endings have a lot of plotholes, it can be assumed that EDI is at worst non-functional when the Destroy option is chosen. The body she houses is synthetic, but perhaps her processors survive. We can only assume, but not prove what isn't shown. So, like I said, until somebody has proof, EDI "dies" when you pick Destroy. Eeveevie 09:21, April 16, 2012 (UTC)

I know people keep claiming that they've seen EDI walk out of the Normandy after picking a destroy ending but to date there are no YouTube videos (undoctored, there are some obviously doctored ones) to prove this.Goodmongo

No, unfortunately EDI does not survive, and neither do the Geth if anyone was wondering. I obtained over 4000 points for war assets which is one of the highest you can get and giving you the 'best' ending, and while everyone including Shepard survived, EDI was one the memorial wall as well as being shown with Thane, Mordin and Legion while Adm. Hackett is talking about those who sacrafised themselves.

As I understand it, it was possible for EDI to emerge from the crashed Normandy in the original endings, but not in the Extended Cut. Terminator-HIX

Would anyone mind if I added that since Reaper components are crucial to EDI's core functionality the Destruction ending means her certain death? We are not talking about the Cerberus mech, or Shepard, we are talking about an Alliance experimental AI mated to pieces of Sovereign that apparently support much of its sentience. I personally (headcanon-wise) like to disregard the Crucible's talk of damaging all technology as misinformation meant to push Shepard into cooperating with its other solutions rather than simply take the Reapers out of the picture, hence disabling the Catalyst's containment plan completely without creating a substitute.

But even in this narrowed context anything that annihilates the Reapers also kills EDI's core systems. We hence should regard such appearances as non-canon (as far as ME has canon). - MA4585159 (talk)

If you want to save EDI (and the peace you made between Geth and Quarians) you cannot choose DESTROY option (unless you believe in IT, in which case the ending is pretty much whatever you decide it is after the fact). The only way to save EDI's life and the Geth on Rannoch is to either choose CONTROL or SYNTHESIS. People have been saying that DESTROY is the appropriate canon choice for many reasons, namely that it keeps with Shepard's ME2 statements about not compromising humanity's soul and utterly destroying the Reapers and because Anderson is shown to choose the DESTROY option. Also because CONTROL is what TIM wanted while SYNTHESIS is what Saren advocated (making them the "wrong" choices). It would be nice to have an updated DESTROY ending where, if you obtained even higher EMS than needed for "good" DESTROY ending, that the catalyst would ONLY target Reapers and heretic Geth. But that's too much to ask of Bioware who, apparently, decided to stick to their guns with defending the designers choices for endings. Job security, huh? STR33D_WEYD